VIDEO INTERVIEW: Dan Berger on Political Prisoners in the United States
By Angola 3 News
This new interview with author/activist Dan Berger was conducted in the Winter of 2009. The interview is mostly based on Berger's essay "The Real Dragons: A Brief History of Political Militancy and Incarceration: 1960s to 2000s," which is featured in the book "Let Freedom Ring: A Collection of Documents from the Movements to Free U.S. Political Prisoners" (PM Press, 2008).
In part one, Berger discusses his new research into US prison movements of the 1970s, which Berger is researching and writing about for his PhD dissertation at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania.
In part two, Berger discusses prisoner movements today, particularly in light of the recent ten-year anniversaries of both Critical Resistance and The Jericho Movement.
Dan Berger is a writer and activist living in Philadelphia. He is the author of "Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity" (AK Press, 2006) and co-editor of "Letters From Young Activists: Today’s Rebels Speak Out" (Nation Books, 2005). Presently, along with his dissertation about 1970s prison movements, he is editing a book about 1970s-era radicalism, titled "Hidden Histories of 1970s Radicalism" (forthcoming from Rutgers University Press in Fall, 2010). His writings have also been published in The International Journal of Communication, The Nation, Punishment & Society, WireTap, Z Magazine, and elsewhere.
The grandson of Holocaust survivors, Berger has long been involved in struggles for social justice. From 2000 to 2003, he served as founding co-editor of ONWARD, a now-defunct internationally distributed quarterly anarchist newspaper based in Gainesville, Florida, that emerged out of the global justice movement. Berger has also been involved in an array of organizing efforts against war, racism, and the prison industrial complex. A longtime activist in support of U.S. political prisoners, Berger has published and presented scholarly essays on news images and prison abuse, alternative media and globalization, and race and social movements.
This new video-interview is made by Angola 3 News, which is an official project of The International Coalition to Free the Angola 3. Over 37 years ago in Louisiana, 3 young black men were silenced for trying to expose continued segregation, systematic corruption, and horrific abuse in the biggest prison in the US, an 18,000-acre former slave plantation called Angola. In 1972 and 1973 prison officials charged Herman Wallace, Albert Woodfox, and Robert King (who then became known as the Angola 3) with murders they did not commit and threw them into 6x9 ft. cells in solitary confinement, for over 36 years. Robert was freed in 2001 after 29 years of continuous solitary confinement, but Herman and Albert remain behind bars.
Through our work supporting the Angola 3, we seeks to spotlight the broader issues that are central to their story, like racism, repression, prisons, human rights, solitary confinement as torture, political prisoners, the legacy of the Black Panther Party, and more. Our first video focused on California death row prisoner Kevin Cooper. Please stay tuned for future videos and more original multi-media projects by visiting www.angola3news.com and our other websites:
www.angola3.org
www.angola3action.org
www.a3grassroots.org
www.kingsfreelines.com
www.hermanshouse.org
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Free All Political Prisoners!
nycjericho@gmail.com • www.jerichony.org
Showing posts with label PR political prisoners. Show all posts
Showing posts with label PR political prisoners. Show all posts
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Parole Carlos Alberto Torres!
From the NYC Jericho Network:
Please read below. Carlos is facing yet another level of repression and right on the heels of being recommended for parole!! Attached are two petitions that we have to collect and get signed. Please fax them to the fax numbers you see on the letters.
Thanks. We need to flood their faxes with these letters and remind them that people care about what happens to Carlos Alberto & Oscar!
--
Michelle Morales
National Boricua Human Rights Network - Chicago Chapter
************************************************
Puerto Rican Political Prisoner Carlos Alberto Torres: parole bid foiled by Bureau of Prisons
July 30, 2009
In January, 2009, Puerto Rican political prisoner Carlos Alberto Torres was scheduled for a parole hearing, after serving 29 years behind bars for his commitment to the independence of Puerto Rico. On the eve of his hearing, prison authorities falsely accused him and eight of his cellmates of possessing knives which the tenth cellmate had hidden— unbeknownst to them all— in the light fixture of the cell. Having maintained an immaculate record for his 29 years in prison, why would Carlos Alberto do something to jeopardize his parole on the eve of his hearing?
The January parole hearing was postponed, the false accusation was ultimately expunged, and he proceeded to hearing in May.
At the May hearing, the hearing examiner for the Parole Commission recommended that he be paroled on April 3, 2010— by when Carlos Alberto will have served exactly 30 years in prison— and advised that we could expect the commission’s final decision within 21 days. However, in June, prison authorities reinstated the false weapons possession charges against Carlos Alberto and his eight cellmates.
On July 28, the Parole Commission notified Carlos Alberto that they would postpone their decision for at least 90 days, pending resolution of the charges.
Two days later, the prison disciplinary hearing officer held hearings on the false weapons charges. Carlos Alberto’s defense consisted not merely of his statement denying possession. The tenth cellmate appeared as a witness, admitting that the knives were his, and his alone, and that Carlos Alberto and none of the other cellmates knew he had hidden the knives in the light fixture. The guilty party also provided a sworn statement to this effect. Much to the surprise of Carlos Alberto and the other eight cellmates, the disciplinary hearing officer nevertheless found them guilty of possessing the hidden weapons.
The finding of guilt will undoubtedly adversely affect the decision of the Parole Commission. Indeed, one might suspect that the reinstatement of the charges and the finding of guilt were calculated to adversely affect the decision.
The National Boricua Human Rights Network and the Comité Pro Derechos Humanos de Puerto Rico are waging a phone and fax campaign to the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the U.S. Parole Commission, asking that the false disciplinary charges be expunged and that Carlos Alberto be released from prison. Sample letters and contact information are provided below.
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863-9977
www.Freedomarchives.org
--
Free All Political Prisoners!
nycjericho@gmail.com • www.jerichony.org
-----------------------------------------------------
Here's the letter to the warden, to cut and paste if you care to:
Here it is to the director of prisons:
Please read below. Carlos is facing yet another level of repression and right on the heels of being recommended for parole!! Attached are two petitions that we have to collect and get signed. Please fax them to the fax numbers you see on the letters.
Thanks. We need to flood their faxes with these letters and remind them that people care about what happens to Carlos Alberto & Oscar!
--
Michelle Morales
National Boricua Human Rights Network - Chicago Chapter
************************************************
Puerto Rican Political Prisoner Carlos Alberto Torres: parole bid foiled by Bureau of Prisons
July 30, 2009
In January, 2009, Puerto Rican political prisoner Carlos Alberto Torres was scheduled for a parole hearing, after serving 29 years behind bars for his commitment to the independence of Puerto Rico. On the eve of his hearing, prison authorities falsely accused him and eight of his cellmates of possessing knives which the tenth cellmate had hidden— unbeknownst to them all— in the light fixture of the cell. Having maintained an immaculate record for his 29 years in prison, why would Carlos Alberto do something to jeopardize his parole on the eve of his hearing?
The January parole hearing was postponed, the false accusation was ultimately expunged, and he proceeded to hearing in May.
At the May hearing, the hearing examiner for the Parole Commission recommended that he be paroled on April 3, 2010— by when Carlos Alberto will have served exactly 30 years in prison— and advised that we could expect the commission’s final decision within 21 days. However, in June, prison authorities reinstated the false weapons possession charges against Carlos Alberto and his eight cellmates.
On July 28, the Parole Commission notified Carlos Alberto that they would postpone their decision for at least 90 days, pending resolution of the charges.
Two days later, the prison disciplinary hearing officer held hearings on the false weapons charges. Carlos Alberto’s defense consisted not merely of his statement denying possession. The tenth cellmate appeared as a witness, admitting that the knives were his, and his alone, and that Carlos Alberto and none of the other cellmates knew he had hidden the knives in the light fixture. The guilty party also provided a sworn statement to this effect. Much to the surprise of Carlos Alberto and the other eight cellmates, the disciplinary hearing officer nevertheless found them guilty of possessing the hidden weapons.
The finding of guilt will undoubtedly adversely affect the decision of the Parole Commission. Indeed, one might suspect that the reinstatement of the charges and the finding of guilt were calculated to adversely affect the decision.
The National Boricua Human Rights Network and the Comité Pro Derechos Humanos de Puerto Rico are waging a phone and fax campaign to the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the U.S. Parole Commission, asking that the false disciplinary charges be expunged and that Carlos Alberto be released from prison. Sample letters and contact information are provided below.
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863-9977
www.Freedomarchives.org
--
Free All Political Prisoners!
nycjericho@gmail.com • www.jerichony.org
-----------------------------------------------------
Here's the letter to the warden, to cut and paste if you care to:
Warden Via facsimile 309/
FCI Pekin Telephone 309/346-8588
P.O. Box 7000
Pekin, IL 61555
Re: Carlos Alberto Torres, 88976-024
FCI Pekin
Dear Warden:
We write to ask that you correct a terrible injustice which has been done to Mr. Torres. In January of 2009, Mr. Torres having served 29 years in prison, and having maintained a clean disciplinary record throughout, was scheduled for a parole hearing. However, prison officials wrongfully accused him of possessing a dangerous weapon— unbeknownst to Mr. Torres, one of the occupants of the ten man cell to which he was assigned had hidden knives in the light fixture. The guilty party admitted sole responsibility and provided a sworn statement, which Mr. Torres offered. The charges were expunged, and the Parole Commission hearing examiner recommended that Mr. Torres be released on April 3, 2010, by which time he will have served exactly 30 years behind bars.
Subsequent to that recommendation, prison authorities re-issued the accusation and notified the Parole Commission, which then issued an order postponing its ruling on the hearing examiner’s recommendation. Inexplicably, last week the disciplinary hearing officer found Mr. Torres guilty of the charges, in spite of the guilty party’s testimony admitting sole responsibility.
This wrongful decision will derail the parole process and postpone Mr. Torres’ release.
We ask that you immediately expunge the wrongful charges. We further ask that you communicate with the Parole Commission to inform them of the expungement, so that they can order Mr. Torres’ release. Thank you.
Very truly yours,
--------------------------------------------
Here it is to the director of prisons:
Harley G. Lappin, Director Via facsimile 202/
Federal Bureau of Prisons Telephone 202/307-3198
320
Re: Carlos Alberto Torres, 88976-024
FCI
Dear Director Lappin:
We write to ask that you correct a terrible injustice which has been done to Mr. Torres. In January of 2009, Mr. Torres having served 29 years in prison, and having maintained a clean disciplinary record throughout, was scheduled for a parole hearing. However, FCI Pekin officials wrongfully accused him of possessing a dangerous weapon— unbeknownst to Mr. Torres, one of the occupants of the ten man cell to which he was assigned had hidden knives in the light fixture. The guilty party admitted sole responsibility and provided a sworn statement, which Mr. Torres offered. The charges were expunged, and the Parole Commission hearing examiner recommended that Mr. Torres be released on April 3, 2010, by which time he will have served exactly 30 years behind bars.
Subsequent to that recommendation, FCI Pekin authorities re-issued the accusation and notified the Parole Commission, which then issued an order postponing its ruling on the hearing examiner’s recommendation. Inexplicably, last week the disciplinary hearing officer found Mr. Torres guilty of the charges, in spite of the guilty party’s testimony admitting sole responsibility.
This wrongful decision will derail the parole process and postpone Mr. Torres’ release.
We ask that you immediately expunge the wrongful charges. We further ask that you communicate with the Parole Commission to inform them of the expungement, so that they can order Mr. Torres’ release. Thank you.
Very truly yours,
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